


Left My Heart in the Sierra Madre

by SciTheSuperb



Category: Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Asexual Character, Dead Money DLC, F/M, Gen, Post-Game(s), Slow Burn, bro i am j. bro i am just sitting here, god i hope i can keep updating this, mentions of christine/veronica
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-07
Updated: 2019-12-01
Packaged: 2021-01-24 18:01:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21342397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SciTheSuperb/pseuds/SciTheSuperb
Summary: Turns out, letting go is a lot easier said than done.
Relationships: Female Courier/Dean Domino
Comments: 2
Kudos: 21





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Aight so... this is my first major fanfic like, EVER, but I absolutely adore Dean Domino so you all get to read my self-indulgent garbage

They say that the Sierra Madre was built to be a paradise, withstanding the tests of time and standing as a monument of the Old World’s frivolity and allure. An oasis in the desert, its broadcast coaxing treasure hunters to find their fortune… ultimately to their doom, as the hazards inside the Villa’s walls eat them alive.

The Sierra Madre was a paradise. But even paradise can be a prison if you can’t leave.

205 years, one month, twelve days. That’s how long Dean Domino had been inside the Sierra Madre. He wasn’t alone, of course… the casino and surrounding grounds now recognized him as a guest, so he was free to roam as he pleased. It was a shame to find some of his little secret spots emptied for everything they were worth… but he had plenty to work with now. He had fun with the casino now that it was his, and that bastard Sinclair got his just desserts in his gilded prison. And the scarred-up darling was still there as well, roaming the grounds as silent as a hologram among the ghosts both digital and solid, guarding the Sierra Madre from whatever, or whoever, may come, as well as keeping its _ guests _ away from the exit. She comes to Dean’s shows sometimes, as his lone watcher among the holographic audience.

“So… Christine,” Dean began as he exited the backstage, catching the Villa warden as she was getting up from her table. She simply gave him a look - silent, now by choice. He supposed that meant he could continue. “Don’t you ever wish you could… oh, I don’t know. Get out of here? See what’s left of the rest of the world?”

Christine paused only for a moment, before quietly shaking her head. She turned her head to look back towards the exit, looked back at Dean, and then shrugged her shoulders and shook her head. _Been there, done that._ With a sigh, Dean plucked a cigarette from the pocket of his blazer and a lighter from another, and he lit it slowly, taking a deep, longing drag from it. If his voice had been preserved all this time, he thought, what harm would a few smokes do?

“So… there’s _ nothing _ you’d want out there? Nothing at all? Nothing to… go back to?” he asked as he quietly exhaled the pale smoke, and his eyes scanned Christine’s expression from behind his sunglasses as he asked his question. It shifted. Her face fell a bit as she glanced down towards the ground, briefly to her right hand, and then back up with her eyes flickering towards the exit. Gotcha. “No… _ one _ to go back to?”

That hit her. She looked saddened at that, before she looked back to Dean and placed a hand over her heart, slowly curling it into a loose fist. She briefly wrapped her arms around herself, and in that moment, looked… tender. Loving. She dropped her arms then, and looked back to Dean. There was his answer.

“Ah… a lover, then? Boyfriend?”

Christine shook her head.

“Husband?”

She shook her head again, harder, scowling a bit.

“...wife?”

She paused, then shook her head again, but gentler this time - and pinched her fingers nearly together, leaving a bit of space between them. _ You’re close. _

“Ahh… girlfriend?” Dean concluded, which earned a nod from his mute friend. A slow smile curled up on his dry lips. “Are you able to go back to her? Does she miss you? You, miss her?”

Christine looked conflicted. A pause followed his question as she thought, before she nodded her head a bit. But then a sad, yet angry frown appeared, and she looked back to Dean before she jerked a thumb over her shoulder at the exit, and then brought her hands to her neck and mimicked an explosion. She then put both her index fingers together, side by side, and held them there for a moment, only to harshly pull them apart again. Dean thought that he understood.

“...but...the Old Man separated you,” he said hesitantly, scanning her face to gauge her reaction. She nodded. A part of him grew saddened then - he understood being pulled apart from someone you love. And truth be told, he hadn’t thought about the Old Man in nearly a year now. He had no need to per se, and… part of him wanted to forget. _ To let go, _ he thought in a bittersweet tone. But now here they were, discussing it again. “Is she dead?”

Christine started to shrug her shoulders, but then after a moment’s pause, shook her head. _ No. She was too resourceful for that. Always the little survivalist. _ Dean chuckled then, low and briefly amused. Christine tilted her head, wondering what was so funny.

“You’re confident she’s still out there, then. You _ could _ go back to her. Who knows? She might be waiting for you. No use in being pessimistic about it, you know?”

Christine listened to him, and then let out a quiet sigh - only to shake her head, point to herself, and then jerk a pointed finger to the floor, and then gesture vaguely around them. _ I’m needed here. _ With that, she turned to leave, but she hesitated as she made it to the exit door. For a brief moment, she looked over her shoulder at Dean, gaze meeting his, before she turned back and made her way out. Now alone, Dean took a seat at one of the tables in front of the stage and took another drag of his cigarette, letting the ashes fall daintily to the table like bitter snow. He was thinking about the Old Man now, and what had happened with that whole mess. He thought about what led him to sit here now, at a stage with his name lit up in neon, waiting two-hundred-some years for the show to go on. He thought about the stranger who saved them all, who brought them all together and then, when all was said and done, left nary a goodbye. He thought, as he nursed his cigarette til it was nearly nothing but ashes scattered on the table, how much of a shame it was that he never even got so much as a name from her.

He thought about the woman he only knew as Six. And he thought about the casino lights that called her home, back to the Mojave, lost in its rolling sands and endless roads. And in the middle of it all lay Las Vegas, entertainment hub of the Mojave, ripe for the taking - all he had to do was walk out the door.


	2. Chapter 2

The lights of New Vegas shone bright from all angles, marking the jewel of the Mojave like a sun that refused to set. All manner of horrid entertainment caroused within its walls, and at the center of it, a tower of a roulette wheel shone bright like the glimmering centerpiece of the New Vegas Strip. It was here that the Queen of New Vegas, as she came to be called, sat with half a bottle of Sarsaparilla poured into a scotch glass that she swirled around idly, watching people mull about below where she sat in the cocktail lounge. Dark eyes scanned the streets below, then the horizon above the buildings, before she hefted out a sigh and set her glass aside. She pushed herself to her feet and strolled to the elevator, hands slipped into the pockets of her slacks, reading glasses slipping down her nose.

It was a quiet ride to the presidential suite, where only she and her favorite eyebot lived now - all her friends had slowly cleared out, one by one, until only the two of them were left. Raul,  _ abuelo _ as she affectionately called him, lived on the edge of Vegas now - just between Freeside and the Strip, and offering repairs to any who would pass through his workshop.  _ I should visit him again soon, _ she thought to herself as she sidled into her master bedroom. Boone was a caravan guard in and out of Vegas now, quiet and stoic as ever, but… happy to be protecting people again. She’d driven out the NCR, but she was happy that he’d stayed. She always did love his company. He was out on a job at the moment, likely wouldn’t be back for at least a few more days. The Courier Queen gently swayed with the tune coming from her pip-boy as she opened her wardrobe to look for something to wear out on the town; she planned on going out, enjoying a few rounds of blackjack at the Tops, seeing a show… a peaceful evening to herself. Might as well wear something nice.

The idle smile on her face was wiped clean when her hands hit rough, somewhat sticky fabric as she rifled through her wardrobe. Her hand slowed, and in a moment, she carefully pushed back a few hanging dresses and an old leather duster marked by a spade before she saw just what she’d hit. She’d pushed it to the very back, out of sight and out of mind, but now it was right there in the open with a bright red X blazing her vision in a way that made her neck itch. Slowly, Six pulled out the filthy jumpsuit from the back of her wardrobe, and just… held it. She held it, and stared at it for a long time. She remembered waking up wearing this, dazed and confused, terrified and in an unfamiliar place, only to feel a cold metal weight like the hand of Death clinging to her neck. A holographic voice spoke to her. The shambling dead cornered her. She had nothing more than a rifle she could barely lift and a rusted knife that could cut through stone like butter, and cut through flesh just as quick. God, the dismemberment, she remembered those cruel acts she had to perform for survival nearly every night since she returned home…

And she remembered her friends. She remembered the disturbed nightkin she helped find peace within himself, where she helped two become one, even if it meant he would never remember her. A happy and healthy stranger was better than a broken, struggling friend. She remembered the quieted soldier with a fire in her eyes like no other, and she remembered comforting her with a simple squeeze of the hand when she was scared out of her wits, unsure if she would survive the night. She remembered her quite fondly.

And she remembered the ghoul, the Old World showboater with a voice like gold and a charm like no other. She remembered snapping back and forth with him like old friends, and she remembered their…  _ exchanges _ , sly words and subtle winks passed back and forth in the rare quiet moments. She remembered helping to calm him when he was panicked and trapped, being there for him when he thought he was going to die. She remembered saving his life… only to leave it as unexpectedly as she arrived.

Six sat on her bed as she held the grimy jumpsuit in her hands, stained red with toxins that had long since lost their potency. She wondered… where were they now? Where had they gone after they’d parted ways? Her mind wandered back to the ghoul - to Dean. She wondered, where was he now? Was he still inside the Sierra Madre, forever unable to let go? Had he finally moved on to bigger and better prospects? He had survived this long in the Villa, among the shambling dead, but… the wilds of the wasteland were a completely different story. He hadn’t lived in it. What if he had gotten out, and ran into something he wasn’t able to outwit? What if he was…?

A string of worried beeping drew Six out of her thoughts, and she glanced up only to see ED-E hovering just a bit above her. Tears she hadn’t even noticed rolled down her cheeks. She blinked, reaching up to feel her dampened face, and she simply shook her head and folded the jumpsuit back up, tucking it far back into her wardrobe once again. “I-I’m alright, ED-E,” she lied, “I’m just… reminiscing. I’m alright. I promise.”

She was met with some rather skeptical beeping, which led her to wipe away the tears on her cheeks, and flash a smile to her little robot friend. “I  _ swear, _ I’m okay… here, do you wanna help me pick out something to wear for a night on the town? You’re more than welcome to join me, honey. People love seein’ you around!”

ED-E beeped a few times in response, before he hovered down beside his caretaker, only to float forward and bump his chassis against a pale blue sundress. Six smiled wider. “Good choice~”

Her mind still wandered, to her long-gone friend, her could-have-been in the Sierra Madre. Seems like she missed a point or two in her adventure there.

She couldn’t seem to let go.


	3. Chapter 3

_ "I should’ve stayed in the fucking villa.” _

The last thing Dean Domino was equipped for was for a trek across a barren, sizzling desert. Even in early December, the sun beating down on the irradiated sands was nearly unbearable, the showman’s bowtie being pulled loose as he adjusted his collar. This was horrible. Everything was  _ horrible. _ Not to mention the wildlife he was encountering as he trudged his way through the dry sand and rock… he’d never seen a scorpion that big in his life, it was a miracle he’d been able to outrun the thing. He never thought he’d say that he missed the villa, but… at this point, it seemed welcoming in comparison. The only thing keeping him pushing forward at this point was getting further away from the Cloud and the ghost people, and getting closer to that glowing skyline of neon. Just a little bit further. Just a few more steps. Rinse and repeat ad infinitum. He’d make it there if it was the last thing he’d do. God, he hoped this wasn’t the last thing he did. This was the last place the great Dean Domino deserved to die after managing to last this long, so…  _ tasteless. _ And dusty. And full of things that would be perfectly content in eating him.

The lights of Las Vegas shone bright as the sun set and the moon climbed upwards in the speckled sky. Dean had to keep moving - a few rests in between wouldn’t hurt, though. He took pause on a particularly large rock, half leaning, half sitting, as he slipped a cigarette out of his pocket and a lighter out of another, the glow of the flame illuminating his face in the pitch-black night of the desert lit only by the thin sliver of moon above, and the distant lights of the jewel of the Mojave. He took long, slow drags of his cigarette as he looked up and around, drinking in this strange new world he’d stumbled into; two hundred-some years inside the Sierra Madre really had dulled his perception of what the world was like, or what it could turn into. And being alone out here… those few days of company he’d gotten in the big heist a year ago was just about the most fun he’d had in somebody’s company in the centuries he’d spent locked up and alone.

“Dean! C’mere, I think I found somethin’!”

“Oh, please, don’t let me hold you up from reveling in your  _ marvelous  _ discoveries,” Dean said with a sigh as he rounded the doorway Six had breezed through, “I’m certain it’s quite interesting. Perhaps we can keep moving now? Or are you going to continue to rifle through derelict suites for… junk.”

Oh, Six. Such a strange woman she was. She managed to find a use for just about anything, didn’t she? Dean watched from the doorway in vague amusement, but mostly boredom, as she scoured the room from top to bottom, rifling through drawers and peeking under chairs, anything her deft little hands could reach. After several minutes of her scrounging, however, she heaved a tired sigh and sat on the creaking bed pushed against one wall of the little room.

“Oh?” Dean chimed as he nonchalantly lit a cigarette, watching idly as the smoke curled up towards the ceiling, “Is the unkillable courier finally… dare I even say it,  _ tired? _ Oh, I never thought I’d see the day.”

“Ah, shut it, Domino,” Six snapped back, but the smile in her voice was unmistakable, humor lacing her tone as she rolled her shoulders, cracked her neck, flexed her fists to crack her knuckles. “B’sides, you’re just as unkillable as I am. I’m just… takin’ a rest. We’ve been at it for a few days now, figured I’d get a quick sit-down while I still can. Can’t remember the last time I slept…”

Dean watched her loosen herself up, a wry smile curling on his thin lips as he nursed his cigarette. “Might as well delay the inevitable, right? Before that  _ delightful _ old fellow blows us all to smithereens the moment he gets what he wants. Go ahead, rest. I’ll be right here. Could use a smoke break…”

“You’re  _ always _ smoking, Dean,” Six laughed, moving to lay back on the rickety bed, hands clasped behind her head. “That can’t be good for your voice, can it? Didn’t ya used to be a lounge singer? Those things’ll make ya sound like you been smokin’ nonstop for the past two hundred years.”

And she laughed then, chuckling incessantly at her own poor joke. Dean gave her only an airy laugh in response, punctuated by pale smoke drifting upwards as his cigarette dwindled down to its end. With a flick of his wrist he tossed it into some forgotten corner, and he glanced over to her, watching as she stared up at the ceiling for a moment before she let her eyes slip closed. Thank god for his sunglasses, he thought as his eyes roamed, watching the subtle flex of her arms as she shifted her hands behind her head, the rise and fall of her chest as she breathed in the comforting scent of smoke lingering in the air, her legs crossed one over the other as she reclined there…

_ Damn, _ he thought as he finally willed himself to look away,  _ I really have been alone here a touch too long. _

“...you just gonna stand there, or you gonna come by and have a rest too?” Six asked suddenly, breaking the silence that hung in the air heavy as a cigar cloud, snapping Dean out of his little trance with a small start. “Plenty of chairs, and the bed’s big enough for too - I’m small, don’t worry. Plenty of room.”

“...you...want me in the same bed as you,” Dean stated in a moment of brief disbelief, before he couldn’t help but to laugh, “Back at the height of my career, you’d be crazy to consider it.”

“Oh, cram it,” Six said with a laugh, cheerful and bright - ringing pleasantly for a change in the dreary red haze of the villa. “That ain’t what I meant at all and you know it. Just get over here, Domino. We’ve both been up for days. Take a fuckin’ nap or something, I dunno.”

“Because that’s certainly all you want, right?”

“Aw, c’mon. I ain’t into that.”

“...into what?”

“Y’know… _ that. _ ”

“...you can say sex, you know. We’re all adults here, dear courier.”

“Fine, I ain’t into sex. So ya don’t gotta worry about me bein’ a creep. Innuendos? Lost to me. Ain’t gonna find any here. Now are ya gonna lay down or not?” Six finally snapped, a little less humor in her tone than before. Dean was a bit surprised by the sudden shift in tone, but… well. He figured it was a bit of a touchy subject. So with no further comment, he stepped over and sat down on the edge of the bed across from her, but didn’t lay down.

“Get some sleep. I’ll keep an eye out, make sure nothing comes by,” he mused as he flicked out another cigarette, “I’ve made it this long, I think I can last a few hours by myself to keep watch.”

“...what’s this? The great Dean Domino, being all selfless and sweet?” Six chimed as she shifted a bit to lay more comfortably, a wry smile on her face. Dean looked back at her, and gave her a look that made her only laugh. _Sweet_ was the last word he would use to describe himself, he thought. “What? Ya caught me by surprise! I ain’t mad at ya, if that’s what you’re thinkin’. I just… get a bit defensive tellin’ folks about my preferences. Joke all ya want I guess, just don’t try and get me into the act, ‘kay?”

“Of course, dear courier,” Dean replied with a quirked smile, before moving to sit back against the headboard, tapping a bit of ash over the side of the bed. “Now sleep before I get bored and decide to make  _ you _ keep watch.”

“Whatever, Domino.”

It was about ten or so minutes after she quieted down that Dean heard her breaths slow and even out, deep and low, a telltale sign that she’d fallen asleep. It was quiet… almost peaceful, he thought. She tossed and turned a bit in her sleep, nothing unusual - he was once again forever grateful for his sunglasses as he gazed at her sleeping form. He’d never seen her so...peaceful.

Dean missed that, he thought as he stood propped up against that large rock in the nighttime desert. He missed that peace, that feeling of…  _ protectiveness _ he’d had over her that evening. It was strange, he thought as he took one final drag of his cigarette, the ash glowing orange as it clung to what remained of the cigarette before he inevitably plucked it from his mouth and tossed it to the sand. No time to get sentimental, though, he thought as he looked out towards the glow of Las Vegas across the desert. Though...he supposed he could take a lesson from her then. Best to take those moments of rest when you find them. You never know when you’ll be able to get another one.

“...you’d best be sleeping, Six…wherever you are,” Dean murmured to himself as he moved to sit against the rock, the lights of Vegas reflected in his sunglasses. He’d never admit to anyone that he missed her - missed her companionship, her wit, the way she treated him like just any other person, but didn’t denounce him. He missed their banter, and he  _ definitely _ missed the off-hand flirting, the subtle touches of the hand as they walked or the small of her back to guide her away from danger. He missed that closeness.

He hoped he’d see her again. The desert was a wide and empty one - easy to get lost in. Wherever the lonesome road she walked took her… part of him hoped that it’d bring her right back towards him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...a grey-asexual protagonist! I'm sorry to disappoint anyone but this fic's not gonna have any... REALLY explicit scenes in it, when these two eventually meet again. There'll definitely be some sensual moments, cuz I'm a self-indulgent little piece of garbage, but for anything truly explicit... sorry ;w;
> 
> I hoped y'all liked this one tho! Sorry for the late posting, I'm a full-time uni student and finals has been absolutely WRECKING me


End file.
